The Canadian Secular Alliance with guest Greg Oliver

In Canada religion and politics are surprisingly intertwined. We have a two school system in many areas. There’s a public school system and a public catholic school system. Our tax dollars go towards religious indoctrination of children and sometimes the religious schools have better, dollars per student funding than their public counterparts. We have extremists much like those fundamentalists in the US attempting to make abortion illegal, ban gay marriage and basically build a theocracy in Canada. In our own province of Saskatchewan our premier is not just devout but an outspoken Christian premier who uses his position of power as a means to promote his religion. In some provinces, teachers are still able to lead the class in prayer and leave anyone who doesn't want to participate as the odd person out. Our national anthem still sings of god and many town councils pray before they get down to business. The town of Taber, next door in Alberta decided to ban spitting, swearing or yelling because of their ridiculous puritanical mentality and in Saskatchewan our government's religious sensibilities had them banning booze in strip clubs. Not that the Regina city council will let anyone build one. You know, zoning laws coincidentally line up with religious ideology. We have a Pope John Paul the second which is problematic but mainly political, and a thousand other infringements which connect our politics and religion. You can basically think of our conservatives as republican light in many respects. Luckily, we also have a Canadian version of the FFRF. They fight the battles they can, in the courts. Trying to get Canada to a decently secular place and to hopefully hold back the tide of religious influence on our government. In this episode, we got to interview Greg Oliver president of the Canadian Secular Alliance. This is episode 26 recorded on March 7, 2015 I'm Cory and joining me in this discussion were Raz, Rene, Destin and Dave.

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